England national team - what would you do ?

[Hugo Sanchez]

Ok so in a few threads, people have been saying England national team is in tatters and we're are just gonna get worst. So how would you fix it ? We have the money, so it's not lack of funding. How do we compete on the world stage ? Germany started all over again in early 2000 and started to invest in youth.

Do our young players get thrown in too quickly ? Are young players like Shaw and Stirling, getting called up too quickly and should they be kept in the U21 and play in youth tournaments to gain experience.

Seriously how do you fix England's national team ??

[Dan]

Go head to head with the Premier League.

Said it in a lot of different threads but whilst the priority remains the Premier League (and it does, look at the commission results in May) then the national team is always being treated secondary, and you'll see a second rate product as a result.

[Pride_Of_The_Midlands]

Sack Roy Hodgson.

[The Doctor]

Annex wales and the colonies, and take their best players.

[kingfox]

Nothing, we will never be as good as the likes of Germany.

[Dan]

Nothing, we will never be as good as the likes of Germany.

Is the reality with our current attitude. I hope to god they don't share that attitude in the FA but they probably do.

[kingfox]

Is the reality with our current attitude. I hope to god they don't share that attitude in the FA but they probably do.

Got to admit though Dan, is England's youth system better or as good than the likes of Germany?

Are England's up and coming players as good as Germany's?

The likes of Sterling & Barkley could become very good players, but can you see them being better than the likes of Gotze & Draxler very doubtful.

[Stadt]

First if all remove all premier league chairmen from their positions at the FA and then force premier league clubs to invest a certain % of their income on their youth systems.

[Ian W LCFC]

Got to admit though Dan, is England's youth system better or as good than the likes of Germany?

Are England's up and coming players as good as Germany's?

The likes of Sterling & Barkley could become very good players, but can you see them being better than the likes of Gotze & Draxler very doubtful.

I think that is the whole point of this thread. To see how you would go about improving our youth system to produce world class talent.

[kingfox]

I think that is the whole point of this thread. To see how you would go about improving our youth system to produce world class talent.

They are all on about this new league system.

But is the talent actually already their at lower league clubs?

Manchester United, Man City, Arsenal etc...might not have the next big English stars, just look at lower down the leagues, Dele Alli at MK Dons for example.

And where their is talent in the Premier League, they are starting to get enough game time already, James Ward-Prowse for instance, our very own Liam Moore.

[Hugo Sanchez]

You Germany but why are they producing some many young world class players, before yesterday though. Their last major win was Euro 96 but now their world champions.

I'd be happy if England went to tournament's and looked like they would win it. Also if I'm honest, I care more for Leicester then I do England. I'm not a big England fan and never been a big supporter of the national team. Is this logic shared with the players ? I read alot of football books and the signs you get from Garry Neville and Jamie Carragher is that their clubs were always top priority.

You can't really predict a england team for Russia 2018 because 4 years is along time and anything could happen regarding players coming through and getting better.

Remember in the 90's when we had Lilleshall Hall ? The best young player's in the country went there to play with the elite of youth players in the country. Do we need something like that?

[Bryn]

The entire footballing culture of the country has to change.

[Dan]

Got to admit though Dan, is England's youth system better or as good than the likes of Germany?

Are England's up and coming players as good as Germany's?

The likes of Sterling & Barkley could become very good players, but can you see them being better than the likes of Gotze & Draxler very doubtful.

No chance. That's why I said as things are. We're a mile behind them and that's a result of our own slacking.

We've got catching up to do. Sadly though given the respective attitude of the two countries when it comes to football, they'll focus more on their improvement than we will even though they've just won the world cup and we've had one of our most embarrassing campaigns ever.

The English game is a total sell-out. We've got a top flight that tries to operate like a super league and an FA who doesn't see this as a hindrance to the national team when it clearly is. Either that or they do see it, but they just don't care.

A massive change in attitude is needed before we can come close to reaching our potential.

[Narborough_fox]

Start with the lowest point of the game and work up from there, the priority at the moment has to be grassroots football because with the numbers getting smaller and smaller every year the pool from which the national team can pick their players will also decrease.

If the FA start funding more grassroots projects then they'll get more players playing for a longer time. Helping teams improve the quality of the pitches, and helping to fund new clubhouses may cost them some money but there will no doubt be an improvement in the numbers that play football at the lowest level giving clubs a larger pool to pick from and therefore nurture for the future.

Furthermore, if you improve the quality of the pitches that (young) teams, and players, are playing on then you're far more likely to see these teams playing a much better style of football than they would on a poor pitch and this will only help improve the style of play that the country adapts as a whole. If you get the idea that playing football on the floor is right at a young age the player will want to do it all their life.

After that they have to make coaching badges cheaper than they are at the minute, if you make them cheaper you'll get more coaches qualifying therefore giving kids at a younger age more coaches to enhance the skills they have as they're more likely to have a qualified coach at their team therefore allowing a young player to have more one-on-one time with a coach who can tell them where to improve their game, unlike just the one coach that many teams have now.

If they are cheaper you're also much more likely to get more high level coaches as the cost won't put them off taking it a to a higher level, England have 1,161 elite coaches compared to Spain who have 12,700 and Germany who have 5,500. This is probably the statistic which scares me the most, Spain, a team who have just won 3 major tournaments, have 11x more elite coaches than England do at the minute, does that not tell it's own story?

There also needs to be a complete overhaul of the youth setup in England, the emphasis needs to be on the skill and technique of the game rather than stamina and strength. Clubs at the highest level should be made to invest in their youth setup which should be governed by the FA to make sure the facilities, and coaching is up to a high enough standard.

Finally, players shouldn't be rejected for being 'too small' it's absolutely horrendous that even goes on today, look at Xavi, Iniesta etc. size shouldn't make a difference if the player should be picked for an academy or not, it should be on their ability. If a player is good enough, they are good enough regardless of their physique. When they do arrive at an academy working on their strength shouldn't start until 16/17 at least.

The FA need to realise that the fix to the national team isn't a long one and will take years for the results to come but if those results are a major trophy then the effort that they've put in, as well as the money, will be worth it.

[Hugo Sanchez]

Also I think with the amount of Asians playing football now and Asian are really big into football these days. Can they be a big part of Englands future ?

It's shocking that we haven't got any Indians playing in the Premiership.

[Dan]

Nice post Narborough_fox. Am I right in saying it costs about ten times as much to get your coaching badges in England as well? I'm sure there's a stat along those kind of lines which wouldn't shock me in the slightest considering how money obsessed we are.

[Miquel The Work Geordie]

It's shocking that we haven't got any Indians playing in the Premiership.

I've no idea why as it's a valid point but I'm absolutely howling at this for some reason, proper tears

[Pride_Of_The_Midlands]

Also I think with the amount of Asians playing football now and Asian are really big into football these days. Can they be a big part of Englands future ?

It's shocking that we haven't got any Indians playing in the Premiership.

Keep an eye out for Yan Dhanda.

Indian Brummie who plays for Liverpool (poached from West Brom) and England U17s.

Maybe he could be the first Asian to play for England.

[Stadt]

Yan Dhanda - what a name

[Narborough_fox]

Nice post Narborough_fox. Am I right in saying it costs about ten times as much to get your coaching badges in England as well? I'm sure there's a stat along those kind of lines which wouldn't shock me in the slightest considering how money obsessed we are.

I seem to remember reading that for Sean Dyche to get to the level he is at the minute it cost £30,000 but I can't seem to find anything to back it up so may well have made that up.

According to Wikipedia the cost of a UEFA A licence in Germany is €530, the cost in Spain is €1,200 whilst the cost in England is.... £5,820. And you wonder why Spain have 11x more qualified coaches than in England.

Take into account that there is still a UEFA Pro licence that you have to get which costs £7,595.00 (includes study visit and iPad) it's easy to see why there is a distinct lack of highly qualified coaches in England. Figure from The Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/mar/28/fa-uefa-pro-licence-course

[Dan]

I seem to remember reading that for Sean Dyche to get to the level he is at the minute it cost £30,000 but I can't seem to find anything to back it up so may well have made that up.

According to Wikipedia the cost of a UEFA A licence in Germany is €530, the cost in Spain is €1,200 whilst the cost in England is.... £5,820. And you wonder why Spain have 11x more qualified coaches than in England.

Take into account that there is still a UEFA Pro licence that you have to get which costs £7,595.00 (includes study visit and iPad) it's easy to see why there is a distinct lack of highly qualified coaches in England. Figure from The Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/mar/28/fa-uefa-pro-licence-course

Sums them up. Everything about the FA points to money. Until we shake that, we'll continue to slip.

[Aus Fox]

Appoint some who knows the game inside out to oversea the national side at all levels, I would suggest Glenn Hoddle as the best person for the job in a director of football type role, make him responsible for hiring and firing all national team coaches from school boys to seniors, develop a game based on playing football the right way.

Have coaches talk and meet together regularly, collaborate on squad decisions. Make sure the best possible squad goes to every tournement u17s 18s 20s 21s and seniors.

Ensure scouts are seeing the best talent this country has to offer, assign a national agent to players from a young age when they get there first call up, encourage these players to experience the whole football world, go and play in Germany, France, Spain, South America.

Look at the teams who are competitive year after year and where their players play, they travel English players are to comfortable.

[Guest ttfn]

Sack Roy Hodgson.

The same Roy Hodgson who led us to that glorious friendly victory over Belgium?

[Jimothy]

Nothing. Ok, so we went out first round this time, but we played a much better style of football this time and the crux if it was, they took their chances, we didn't. Scraping through the group due to a late Defoe goal against Slovenia is hardly good going. I can see greenshoots of improvement, despite on the face of it looking like we've actually gone backwards, we haven't really.

Some projects have already been put in place to try and improve things and bring more youngsters through. We're trying to get more qualified coaches, we've built a new training centre. I agree with bringing someone in like Hoddle to oversee it all, but that's tweak to the system, we don't really need to make huge sweeping changes, we just need to let the changes we've made bare fruit. Our attitude to international football in England is much the same as our attitude to education. We implement ideas to try and improve the situation, and then before they have chance to make any difference we get a new set of result (ie exam results or a World Cup/Euros) and we start to panic again and throw everything out and start again. It's took Germany 12 years to get to this stage, it's took Belgium a decade to go from terrible to dark horse quater finalists, it took Spain over a decade to get win the title. We've only just started on our journey, it's frustrating we waiting so long to start that journey and is not fun watching us whilst we wait for it to start making a difference, but we have to let it happen, it's pointless changing tact every time we fail.

[RowlattsFox]

We do produce good players up until a level, the challenge is to take them to the next level.

Our players all play at decent premier league level so players are getting the chance, ok there may be more out there who don't get a chance but generally if you're good enough you'll make your way to a decent level.

I think management is a major issue, we need someone who can get the best out of players and make them reach their potential. Also think the lack of English managers at top level is a problem as well.

More needs to be done to ensure the big clubs are developing young English talent and not filling academies with youngsters from abroad.

A lot of it is down to individual players themselves, their personalities and egos. Let's hope the likes of Ross Barkley buck the trend and can live upto the expectations and not buckle under the pressure.

Pressure is another thing we can't seem to handle. From media and supporters, we play with fear.